By Jeffrey Sachs, Consortium News, 6/8/23

President John F. Kennedy was one of the world’s great peacemakers. He led a peaceful solution to the Cuban Missile Crisis and then successfully negotiated the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty with the Soviet Union at the very height of the Cold War. At the time of his assassination, he was taking steps to end U.S. involvement in Vietnam. 

In his dazzling and unsurpassed Peace Speech, delivered 60  years ago on June 10, 1963, Kennedy laid out his formula for peace with the Soviet Union.

Kennedy’s Peace Speech highlights how Joe Biden’s approach to Russia and the Ukraine War needs a dramatic reorientation. Until now, Biden has not followed the precepts that Kennedy recommended to find peace. By heeding Kennedy’s advice, Biden too could become a peacemaker. 

A mathematician would call JFK’s speech a “constructive proof” of how to make peace, since the speech itself contributed directly to the Partial Nuclear Test Ban Treaty signed by the U.S. and Soviet Union in July 1963. Upon receipt of the speech, Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev told Kennedy’s envoy to Russia, Averell Harriman, that the speech was the greatest by an American president since Franklin D. Roosevelt, and that he wanted to pursue peace with Kennedy.

‘No More Urgent Task’

In the speech, Kennedy describes peace “as the necessary rational end [goal] of rational men.” Yet he acknowledges that peacemaking is not easy: “I realize that the pursuit of peace is not as dramatic as the pursuit of war — and frequently the words of the pursuer fall on deaf ears. But we have no more urgent task.” 

https://youtube.com/watch?v=0fkKnfk4k40%3Ffeature%3Doembed

The deepest key to peace, in Kennedy’s view, is the fact that both sides want peace. It is easy to fall into the trap, warns Kennedy, of blaming a conflict only on the other side. It is easy to fall into the trap of insisting that only the adversary should change their attitudes and behavior. Kennedy is very clear: “We must reexamine our own attitude — as individuals and as a Nation — for our attitude is as essential as theirs.”

Kennedy attacked the prevailing pessimism at the height of the Cold War that peace with the Soviet Union was impossible, “that war is inevitable — that mankind is doomed — that we are gripped by forces we cannot control. We need not accept that view. Our problems are man-made—therefore, they can be solved by man.” 

Crucially, said Kennedy, we must not “see only a distorted and desperate view of the other side.” We must not “see conflict as inevitable, accommodation as impossible, and communication as nothing more than an exchange of threats.” Indeed, said Kennedy, we should “hail the Russian people for their many achievements —in science and space, in economic and industrial growth, in culture and in acts of courage.” 

Oct. 7, 1963: President John F. Kennedy signing the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, surrounding by aides and advisers. (Robert Knudsen, White House, John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain)

‘Collective Death Wish’ Warning 

Kennedy warned against putting a nuclear adversary into a corner that could lead the adversary to desperate actions. “Above all, while defending our own vital interests, nuclear powers must avert those confrontations which bring an adversary to a choice of either a humiliating retreat or a nuclear war. To adopt that kind of course in the nuclear age would be evidence only of the bankruptcy of our policy — or of a collective death wish for the world.” 

Kennedy knew that since peace was in the mutual interest of the U.S. and the Soviet Union, a peace treaty could be reached. To those who said that the Soviet Union would not abide by a peace treaty, Kennedy responded that

“both the United States and its allies, and the Soviet Union and its allies, have a mutually deep interest in a just and genuine peace and in halting the arms race. Agreements to this end are in the interests of the Soviet Union as well as ours—and even the most hostile nations can be relied upon to accept and keep those treaty obligations, and only those treaty obligations, which are in their own interest.” 

Kennedy emphasized the importance of direct communication between the two adversaries. Peace, he said, “will require increased understanding between the Soviets and ourselves. And increased understanding will require increased contact and communication. One step in this direction is the proposed arrangement for a direct line between Moscow and Washington, to avoid on each side the dangerous delays, misunderstandings, and misreadings of the other’s actions which might occur at a time of crisis.” 

In the context of the Ukraine War, Biden has behaved almost the opposite of JFK. He has personally and repeatedly denigrated Russian President Vladimir Putin. His administration has defined the U.S. war aim as the weakening of Russia. Biden has avoided all communications with Putin. They have apparently not spoken once since February 2022 and Biden rebuffed a bilateral meeting with Putin at last year’s G20 Summit in Bali, Indonesia. 

March 26, 2022: U.S. President Joe Biden speaking at the Royal Castle in Warsaw, where he said Putin “cannot remain in power.” (White House, Adam Schultz)

Biden has refused to even acknowledge, much less to address, Russia’s deep security concerns. Putin repeatedly expressed Russia’s ardent opposition to NATO enlargement to Ukraine, a country with a 2,000-kilometer border with Russia. The U.S. would never tolerate a Mexican-Russian or Mexican-Chinese military alliance in view of the 2000-mile Mexico-U.S. border. It is time for Biden to negotiate with Russia on NATO enlargement, as part of broader negotiations to end the Ukraine war. 

When Kennedy came into office in January 1961, he stated clearly his position on negotiations:

“Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate. Let both sides explore what problems unite us instead of belaboring those problems which divide us.” 

In his Peace Speech, JFK reminded us that what unites the U.S. and Russia is that “we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children’s future. And we are all mortal.”

Jeffrey D. Sachs, author of To Move the World: JFK’s Quest for Peace, is a university professor and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, where he directed The Earth Institute from 2002 until 2016. He is also president of the U.N. Sustainable Development Solutions Network and a commissioner of the U.N. Broadband Commission for Development. He has been adviser to three United Nations secretaries-general, and currently serves as an SDG Advocate under Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. Sachs is the author, most recently, of A New Foreign Policy: Beyond American Exceptionalism (2020). Other books include: Building the New American Economy: Smart, Fair, and Sustainable (2017) and The Age of Sustainable Development, (2015) with Ban Ki-moon.

This article is from  Common Dreams.

Link here.

The National Endowment for Democracy (NED) contacted The Grayzone to dispute our characterization of their organization as a CIA cutout. Listen to the highly revealing conversation that ensued with the NED’s communications director.

Full report here: https://thegrayzone.com/2023/05/29/gr…

By Dan Kovalik & Rick Sterling, Antiwar.com, 5/30/23

In May of this year, we took the long, 27-hour train ride from Moscow to Crimea to see how life is there and what the sentiment of the people are as the US and Ukraine sharpen their threats to “recapture” this peninsula from Russia. And, while we were there, these threats were backed by a series of terrorist drone attacks in Crimea which, while doing little serious damage, signaled an escalation in the US/Ukrainian assault on Crimea.

Despite such threats and attacks, what we found in this historic peninsula on the Black Sea was a beautiful, almost idyllic place with a bustling economy and a general sense of prosperity and hopefulness. We also found a people who seem quite content to remain a part of Russia just as Crimea has been, except for a brief interval, since 1783.

During our trip, we visited the three major cities of Simferopol, Sevastopol, and Yalta.

The Capital Simferopol

Simferopol is an inland city with about half a million residents. There are universities as well as Crimea’s parliament and industry. When we visited it, most people were enjoying the holidays. We saw multiple groups of teenagers singing patriotic songs on the street and in front of memorials. It is difficult to imagine something comparable happening in the US or Canada. The difference may be partly the result of education but it also shows the different consciousness and experience. Approximately 1 in every seven citizens died in WW2 so every family in the Soviet Union lost family members. The Nazi invasion and occupation were horrible, real and impacted every one.

In Simferopol we met two women, Larisa and Irina, who described in detail what happened in early 2014. Confrontations started when a small group of ultra-nationalists tried to demolish the statue of Lenin in the capital center. Seeing this as an attack on their Soviet and Russian heritage, a much larger group gathered and stopped them.

Then, three police who were residents of Crimea were killed in Maidan protests. As their corpses were brought home, there was increasing fear that the violence in Kiev could come to Crimea. Volunteers formed self-defense battalions.

Hundreds of Crimeans went to Kiev on chartered buses to peacefully protest against the Maidan chaos and violence The violence climaxed with the killing of police and protesters by snipers located in opposition controlled buildings on February 20. The Crimeans realized that peaceful protests were hopeless and departed back to Crimea on the chartered buses. At the town of Korsun, the convoy of eight buses was stopped by a gang from the Neo-Nazi “Right Sector.” Dozens people were beaten and seven Crimeans killed.

On February 22 the elected Ukraine government was overthrown. On its first day in power, the coup government enacted legislation to remove Russian as a state language. These events provoked shock, fear and the urgent desire to re-unify with Russia. According to Larisa and Irina, there was a huge popular demand to hold a referendum to secede from Ukraine.

The Crimean parliament agreed and first proposed to have the referendum in May. The popular demand was to have it much sooner. Larisa says that on February 27 the Russian flag was flying over parliament. She does not know how, but says, “It was like a miracle.” People sensed then that Russia might accept Crimea. Suddenly there were Russian flags all over the city.

There was still the fear of violence. Soldiers in green uniforms without insignia, known as the “polite men” appeared at key locations such as the airport and parliament. It is generally understood these were Russian special forces. They were heartily welcomed by nearly all and events proceeded without violence. Larisa laughed at western journalists who used the photograph of a WW2 tank in a park, to suggest that Russian tanks were in the capital.

There was no involvement by Russia in the referendum; it was organized and carried out by the traditional election council on March 16. The results were decisive: with 83% voting, 97% voted to rejoin Russia.

Two days later the Crimean parliament appealed to the Russian Federation. Two days after that the agreement was signed in Moscow. Larisa and Irina say, “Everyone was happy”; they call it “Crimea Spring.”

Nuclear Submarines Museum

We visited many amazing places in Crimea. In the port town of Balaklava, we visited a museum which reminded us of the increasing danger of nuclear war. The first class museum is located in the site where Soviet submarines were repaired, refitted and nuclear missiles installed. The site is a tunnel at sea level under a mountain. The tunnel goes from the open Black Sea to the protected Balaklava harbor. Under the mountain, the submarines could survive any attack and respond if necessary. When we visited, many school children were also there, learning about the dangers of nuclear war, how and why Russia felt the need to develop their own nuclear capacity. The educational graphics start with the fact that the US dropped nuclear bombs on Japan, and why Russia must be prepared to defend itself. Today this site is an educational museum. We don’t often think about nuclear weapons and the likelihood they could be used if war was to break out between Russia and the US. The museum shows they take this very seriously. Russia’s active nuclear armed submarines are located in Vladivostok and elsewhere.

The Valley of Death

Driving north from Balaklava, we paused at a memorial overlooking a valley that was scene of an important battle in the Crimean war of 1854. It was immortalized in Alfred Tennyson’s poem
“The Charge of the Light Brigade” where British cavalry charged embedded Russian forces and suffered many losses. The poem says “Into the valley of death rode the six hundred.” A famous photograph taken by one of the first war time photographers shows a barren hillside strewn with cannon balls which mowed down the British attackers.

The great Russian author Leo Tolstoy was a volunteer fighter in the Crimean War, and he himself documented his experiences in battle. As one Crimean told us in making the point that Crimea has been part of Russia for a very long time, “the Crimean War was a Russian war; it wasn’t a Ukrainian war.”

Today those valleys have grazing sheep and vineyards with premier wineries comparable to those in Napa Valley, California. Visitors do wine tasting just like in California. The past war and bloodshed seem far away.

Sevastopol – A Special City

Further north is Sevastopol, a thriving city and the base of the Russian Black Sea naval fleet. Sevastopol is known as “the most Soviet City in Russia and the most Russian City in Ukraine,” and even the City Hall continues to bear the hammer and sickle emblem on its gates.

When Ukraine seceded from the Soviet Union in 1991, Russia negotiated a long term lease for the naval port. The Russian military has been in this port for 240 years. Along with Russian navy ships, there are locals fishing from the docks. There is a laid back, casual air to the port although the war hit close to home when Russia’s naval ship “Moskva” was sunk early in the conflict.

Tanya introduced us to former Soviet and Ukrainian Navy captain Sergey. He described how, when the decision was made to secede from Ukraine in spring 2014, many enlisted sailors and officers chose to be in the Russian rather than Ukrainian navy. Throughout our visit it was emphasized that Crimea has been Russian since 1783 and the large majority of the population have Russian as their native language and consider themselves Russian.

People in Russia are very conscious of war and fascism. They call WW2 the Great Patriotic War. The Soviet Union caused by far the most losses of Axis soldiers. The US, Canada, and other allies supported the war with troops and supplies but it was the Soviet Union that bore the brunt of the war and was the primary cause of victory over Nazi Germany.

Crimea was a major target of the Nazi Axis and was the scene of some of the bloodiest battles of WW2. Despite stiff resistance the peninsula was temporarily defeated. After 250 days of siege, Sevastopol was captured by the Germans in June 1942. Crimea was retaken by the Soviet Red Army in 1944.

This history may explain why Crimeans are adamantly opposed to ultra nationalist hate filled rhetoric and why they decisively chose to reunify with Russia following the overthrow of the elected Ukraine government in February 2014.

In Sevastopol we visited the Partisan Museum which is a house where anti-fascist Crimeans organized resistance to the Nazi occupation. The house had a hidden basement where fliers were printed and partisans organized the sabotage campaigns.

A few miles south of Sevastopol is the hilltop where Nazi German command was based. It has been converted into a memorial and during our visit on Saturday prior to May 9 Victory Day, there were educational exhibitions and military displays along with miniature tanks driven by kids in a 50 foot track.

Yalta

In a palace at Yalta, the leaders of the US, UK and Soviet Union negotiated the spheres of influence in Europe after the defeat of the axis powers. The three countries were allies in WW2 but in just a few years the Cold War emerged.

Yalta is a thriving tourist city. The palace where Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin met is open for visitors. During our visit, the hotels in Yalta were near capacity and the promenade and city streets were full of locals and visitors. Russians who used to travel to West Europe are now traveling about their own huge country and Crimea is especially popular.

Reflections on Crimea

Crimea is incredibly beautiful and historic. Today, despite occasional sabotage actions, the situation in Crimea is calm and inviting.

Following Crimea’s secession, Ukraine tried to punish Crimeans by cutting off the electricity supply to the peninsula. They were without power for five months. Next Ukraine blocked the fresh water supply.

Despite these hostile actions, Crimeans display no hostility to regular Ukrainians. They say, “They are our brothers and sisters.” Ukrainian is a state language in Crimea and Ukrainians are respected. There are statues honoring Ukrainian writers and artists. Many Ukrainian civilians have come to Crimea to escape the war.

Sergey says that Crimeans are sad about the conflict in Ukraine but will continue, slowly and patiently, to victory.

Irina says, “Zelensky will sooner take back the Moon than take back Crimea.”

Dan Kovalik is a human rights attorney and author of seven books. His email address is DKovalik@outlook.com.

Rick Sterling is a journalist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. His email is rsterling1@gmail.com.

By Andrew Korybko, Substack, 6/8/23

The exact same scenario that was previously smeared by the European External Action Service as a “recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative” is now being extended credence by none other than former NATO chief Anders Rasmussen.

Former NATO Secretary-General Anders Rasmussen predicted that “If NATO cannot agree on a clear path forward for Ukraine, there is a clear possibility that some countries individually might take action.” He then speculated that “I think the Poles would seriously consider going in and assemble a coalition of the willing if Ukraine doesn’t get anything in Vilnius.” As surreal as it may sound, this exact same scenario forecast had hitherto been smeared as “Russian propaganda” by official EU entities.

The East StratCom Task Force (ESCTF), which is part of the European External Action Service, has a project called “EUvsDisinfo” where they debunk so-called “Russian propaganda”. They’ve regularly claimed that the specific scenario that NATO’s former chief just talked about is a “recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative”, thus suggesting that Rasmussen is a “Russian puppet”. The ESCTF of course didn’t intend to discredit him and will likely recalibrate their narrative in light of his latest words.

Nevertheless, the point is that the exact same scenario that was previously smeared as a “recurring pro-Kremlin disinformation narrative” is now being extended credence by none other than the former leader of the US’ anti-Russian military bloc. This vindicates the repeated warnings from Russian Foreign Intelligence Service chief Sergey Naryshkin since the start of his country’s special operation that Poland is plotting a military intervention in Ukraine.

Considering the way in which the Western narrative on this scenario has evolved over the past year, it can therefore be concluded that there’s a credible chance of it unfolding in the coming future, which naturally prompts the question of what changed to account for this reversal. Rasmussen’s successor Jens Stoltenberg declared in mid-February that NATO is in a “race of logistics”/“war of attrition” with Russia, which implied that the latter’s military-industrial output is equivalent to his entire 31-member bloc’s.

Russia’s victory in the Battle of Artyomovsk proved that the abovementioned dynamics are trending in its favor, which bodes ill for Kiev’s NATO–backed counteroffensive. It’s precisely because the odds of success are increasingly stacked against it that this fascist regime just blew up the Kakhovka Dam out of desperation to divide the defenders’ focus in order to facilitate a breakthrough across the frontlines. There’s also the chance that it could expand the conflict to Belarus and/or Moldova for the same reason.

In the event that these gambits fail and Kiev’s NATO-backed counteroffensive can’t overcome the stalemate that this conflict has slipped into for over the past half year, then the West would have to do something else that they can spin to their voters as making this $165 billion proxy war seem worthwhile. Therein lies the relevance of meaningful progress being made on including Ukraine in NATO during next month’s summit exactly as Rasmussen suggested in order for it to be spun as a major defeat for Russia.

UK Defense Secretary Ben Wallace already told the Washington Post in a recent interview that “We have to be realistic and say: [Ukraine joining NATO is] not going to happen at Vilnius’; It’s not going to happen anytime soon”, which even Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky begrudgingly recognized is true. For this reason, French President Emmanuel Macron suggested extending “tangible and credible” security guarantees to that former Soviet Republic during the upcoming summit instead.

Even if a series of mutual defense pacts similar in spirit to the one that the US reached with South Korea shortly after the armistice is agreed to, it might still not be enough to satisfy the Western public’s demands, nor those of Zelensky’s supporters at home. Poland, which aspires to become the regional hegemon of Central & Eastern Europe, could then take the lead in organizing the so-called “coalition of the willing” that Rasmussen predicted in order to de facto expand NATO’s nuclear umbrella over Ukraine.

The formal presence of NATO states’ conventional troops in that country could serve to inspire confidence in whatever Korean-like mutual defense pacts might soon be offered by the bloc’s members to Ukraine during next month’s summit. Moreover, they could also serve to freeze the Line of Contact (LOC) by deterring Russian attacks out of fear that they’ll indirectly trigger Article 5 if that alliance’s forces are injured as a result of whatever actions the Kremlin takes, including those done in self-defense.

The military-strategic dynamics of this conflict would therefore radically shift in an instant should Rasmussen’s scenario forecast come to fruition, particularly since the deployment of NATO states’ forces along the LOC could prevent Russia from pushing back into Ukraine if Kiev expands the conflict to Belarus and/or Moldova. At most, Moscow could then only hope for them to return to their prior positions instead of seeking to exploit their potential defeat to go on the offensive along those fronts.

All told, it makes perfect sense from the perspective of the West’s military-strategic and narrative interests for Poland to lead a “coalition of the willing” into Ukraine by sometime this summer, especially if Kiev’s NATO-backed counteroffensive fails to seriously shift the LOC. Although incredibly dangerous with respect to spiking the chances of a hot NATO-Russian war by miscalculation, those leaders might still choose to roll the dice out of desperation to obtain something that can be spun as a “victory”.

Russia foresaw precisely this scenario over a year ago, but it wasn’t until recently that more than just Poland had an interest in seeing it happen. The West smeared this forecast as “Russian propaganda” up until now in order to gaslight its targeted audience into thinking that nothing of the sort was being plotted, only for NATO’s former chief to now predict the exact same thing as Russia did. Everything is moving very fast so this prediction might soon unfold, though it can’t be taken for granted either.

By Dan Kovalik & Rick Sterling, Dissident Voice, 5/25/23

At the end of April of this year, the two of us ventured together to Russia. We went with the purpose of fact-finding and also to make a point that we do not believe that Russia should be isolated from the world through sanctions and travel bans.

At this moment, Russia is more isolated from the West than it has ever been, quite possibly in history. As just one example, while V.I. Lenin was able to famously travel from Finland via train to St. Petersburg, even during the height of WWI, the train from Finland to Russia ceased operating after February 24 of 2022. And indeed, it was through Finland that we decided to travel to Russia, simply because there are now very limited ways to travel there. Thus, while for years, even during the Cold War, one could easily fly directly from the US to Russia on Aeroflot and other airlines, that is no longer possible due to sanctions. Now, one can only fly there through Serbia, Turkey or the UAE, but those flights are quite expensive.

And so, we ended up choosing to fly to Helsinki, Finland and have a Russian friend who has a non-Russian passport (Russians with only Russian passports cannot travel to Finland) drive from St. Petersburg to pick us up. This turned out to be more easily said than done as our friend’s car broke down at the Finnish/Russian border. And so, we took a very expensive, three-hour cab ride to the border, met up with our friend and crammed ourselves into the cab of a tow truck to drive the remaining three hours to St. Petersburg – a quite inauspicious beginning to our journey.

Saint Petersburg streets are busy from early morning til late at night. This photo taken at 11:30pm

St. Petersburg (Leningrad)

Our first several days were spent in St. Petersburg, formerly “Leningrad.” We stayed strategically at the Best Western in Uprising Square – so named by the new Bolshevik government in 1918 to commemorate the Great October Revolution of 1917. In the Square is located the Moscow train station which we used to great effect during our journey, as well as the Leningrad Hero-City Obelisk. The Obelisk commemorates Leningrad’s designation as one of 13 “hero cities” in the Soviet Union which distinguished themselves for their exceptional sacrifices in resisting the Nazis during WWII. Two other cities we visited on our trip (Moscow and Sevastopol, Crimea) are also honored with this designation, as is Kiev, Ukraine and of course Volgograd (formerly “Stalingrad”).

During our stay, the city of St. Petersburg sure seemed more like Leningrad, for it was beginning to be decked out in red flags with hammers and sickles and stars to commemorate both May Day and Victory Day over the Nazis on May 9. We were told by long-time residents that the ubiquitous display of such symbols of the USSR was something new (at least since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991), and was spurred on by Russia’s Special Military Operations beginning in February of 2022. It appears that the Russian people, and the Russian government as well, are looking to the legacy of the Soviet Union as a source of strength, pride and unity during this time of war – a war that they view, we believe quite rightly, was forced on them.

The newly released Russian Federation “concept” on foreign policy states quite explicitly that Russia’s current foreign policy is informed by the two main objectives and successes of the USSR – the defeat of Nazism and global decolonization. Certainly, on paper at least, this belies the claim of some Western leftists that Russia is motivated in its relations with other nations by imperialist concerns.

Dan takes his turn playing guitar on St Petersburg street at 11 pm

While in St. Petersburg, we visited the site of the terrorist attack which claimed the life of Russian journalist Vladlen Tatarsky and wounded over 30 others, at least 10 gravely. The attack involved the bombing of a cafe in the picturesque University district of St. Petersburg along the Neva – a soft target if there ever was one. The cafe remains closed, and three sets of memorials for Tatarsky are set up around it, consisting of flowers and photos. Of course, the Western press has tried to do everything it can to justify this vicious attack upon civilians, writing off Tatarsky as “pro-Kremlin” and “pro-war” (as if the Western press can’t be fairly characterized as “pro-war” and “pro-Pentagon”) and simply glossing over the numerous other civilians wounded in the assault as collateral damage.

Rick and Dan at the site where Russian journalist was killed

Moscow

As planned, we left St. Petersburg by train to Moscow after several days. We took the faster “Sapsan” (Falcon) train to Leningrad Station in Moscow (it is still called that). The train ride, reaching 120 mph, was smooth and comfortable. We sat across from two Russian women, one of whom was quite friendly. She told us of her son who lives in Boston and who, quite sadly for her, she hasn’t seen in years. She kept sliding over hard candy to share with us. And, when she saw Dan nervously biting his nails, she kindly handed him her nail filer for him to use. This type of sharing on the train is quite common in Russia as we would continue to discover on our journey.

Rick with train compartment companions

Moscow too was being decorated for the May 9 Victory Day celebration. Red Square was sealed off from the public to prepare for the event, and the city was on high alert for possible terrorist attacks, one of which would come while we were in Russia with the drone attack upon the Kremlin itself. Despite the fears of attack, Muscovites were out on the streets day and night. Both Moscow and St. Petersburg were incredibly vibrant – much more so than our cities back home which are still feeling the effects of the lockdowns during the pandemic. Gorky Park was particularly lively with throngs of families with children enjoying the spring weather, swings and slides. Colorful tulips were in full bloom.

From appearances, Russia largely did not appear to be a country at war. However, everyone we talked to confided in us about their concerns for the war – for the loss of life on both sides, the fact that it was lasting much longer than people had expected, and the danger that the war could expand into a greater conflagration. Some Russians expressed their fear that nuclear weapons would end up being used before this was all over, though they believed that the US would be the first to launch them. At the same time, the Russians showed their usual stoicism in the face of such dangers, with one family with whom Dan had dinner stating almost matter-of-factly that “Russia has always had difficult times, and it will have them again.”

After several days in Moscow, and our hopes for visiting the Donbass falling through, we took the long, 27-hour train ride to Crimea – a region now fully in the crosshairs of the proxy war.

Arriving in Crimea

Ukrainian President Zelensky says he will “take back” Crimea. US leaders Victoria Nuland and Jake Sullivan say they support him. Indeed, Sullivan recently suggested Ukraine is free to use the F-16 fighter jets in attempting to “recapture” Crimea.” We traveled to Crimea to see the situation and learn details of how and why Crimea seceded from Ukraine in 2014.

A highlight of the train ride was passing over the new 12-mile long Kerch Strait bridge which connects mainland Russia to the Crimean peninsula. As our train approached the bridge, we could see that saboteurs had been active. There was a fuel tank on fire in the near distance. A couple passengers did not want us to photograph this, probably thinking it gives publicity to the enemy.

As we departed the train in Crimea at the beautiful station in the Capitol city, Simferopol, the loudspeakers on the platform greeted us with traditional Russian songs.

We then drove the roughly two hours to Yalta where we stayed while in Crimea. Along our drive, we saw the giant mosque which the Russian government is building along the highway in an area where Tatars, who generally practice the Islamic faith, protested to have land to live and worship. The Tatars had been persecuted during WWII as suspected collaborators and forcibly removed from Crimea to other Soviet Republics.

A number of Tatars have moved back to Crimea over the years and now make up about 12 percent of the population of Crimea. Meanwhile, about 65 percent of the Crimean population is ethnic Russian and about 15 percent is Ukrainian, though about 82 percent of the population overall speaks Russian on a daily basis.

As we were told while in Crimea, one of the first things President Putin did after Crimea returned to Russia in 2014 was to try to make good relations with the Tatar community by “rehabilitating” them from the claims of collaboration made by Stalin government, giving them the land they protested for, providing them with modest monetary reparations and building them the new Mosque.

Historical Background

All in all, we spent five days seeing the sights and meeting people in the capital Simferopol, Sevastopopol and Yalta. We were guided by translator and native Crimean Tanya. In the past, Tanya worked for US Aid for International Development (USAID), teaching Russian to US Peace Corps volunteers.

Crimea has a rich agricultural sector. It was severely hampered after Ukraine dammed the canal bringing fresh water from the Dnieper River. After Russian forces intervened, they removed the dam and agriculture is once again thriving. Crimean cities are busy with the streets and sidewalks full. In the parks, there are teens skate boarding and seniors playing chess.

The situation in Crimea is emblematic of the Ukraine crisis overall. In both Crimea and the Donbass (eastern Ukraine), the majority of people are ethnically Russian, their native language is Russian and they voted overwhelmingly for the elected but overthrown President Yanukovich.

From the 15th century Crimea was part of the Ottoman Empire. It became part of the Russian Empire in 1783 after the army of Catherine the Great defeated the Turks.

In 1921, Crimea became the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic as part of the Russian Soviet Socialist Republic.

In 1954, Soviet Premier Khrushchev designated Crimea to be part of the Ukraine republic. This was done without consulting the Crimean people but it was not a major change since they were all part of one country, the Soviet Union. As we were told in Crimea, “Nobody could imagine the Soviet Union breaking up.”

As the Soviet Union was breaking up, Crimeans held a referendum in January of 1991. They voted overwhelmingly (94% in favor) to become the “Autonomous Republic of Crimea” and to separate from Ukraine. There was contention with Kiev and ultimately it was agreed that Crimea would be autonomous but within Ukraine. There was desire but not the urgency to secede from Ukraine at this point.

The desire to separate from Ukraine became more urgent in late 2013 and early 2014 as Crimeans watched with alarm as Russophobic ultra-nationalist and neo-nazi groups increasingly dominated violent protests in Kiev’s Maidan plaza. The book To Go One’s Own Way documents how the Crimean parliament and presidency issued statements, pleas and warnings about the threat to Ukrainian unity beginning in November 2013.

As we discuss in an upcoming article, the government of Ukraine reacted to the Crimean referendum to reunite with Russia quite punitively, and it continues to punish the Crimeans for their decision. At the same time, Russia has actively invested in the peninsula and made major improvements in the overall infrastructure there. In light of the foregoing, it is safe to say there are relatively few Crimeans who ever wish to return to Ukraine.

Dan Kovalik is a human rights attorney and author of seven books. Rick Sterling is a journalist based in the San Francisco Bay Area. Read other articles by Dan Kovalik and Rick Sterling.